Diana Mini: Half Sized but Double the Fun

Here are some techniques you can try with your Diana Mini with some of its accessories: Half frame, square, multiple, strobe flash, fake panorama, fisheye, macro, tunnelvision

The Lomography Diana Mini is a small power toy which gives you really lots of fun. It is a 35mm camera, so it takes regular films, which is a plus beccause you can go to almost every lab without hassle. The petite Diana has different settings (cloudy and sunny measured for 400 iso films) and N (ca. 1/60 sec.) and B (bulb, so as long as you want to), so it is very easy to use. The distance setting works by turning the lens and you have four settings: 0,6m, 1-2m, 2-4m and infinity. You can add the Diana Flash and with the adapter any other hotshoe flash (e.g. Colorsplash Flash), a tripod and a cable release. Another plus is that you can choose between two different photo formats: square, so you got 36 square images on a regular film or half frame, that means you get twice as much (72) photos.
But that is not all. You can take “regular” shots (I like to take pairs when I use the half frame mode)

Or square:

Or make multiple exposures:

As you can add a tripod, a flash and a cable release (a long one or one you can set fix) and you have the B-setting (but don’t forget to set B back to N!) you can easily make strobe flash photos. You need a strobe flash (e.g. Holgon Strobe Flash) and a dark room (otherwise the shots may be overexposed. Get everything started and MOVE!

Another technique is the fake panorama, where you don’t advance totally to next frame, so the shots overlap a bit. Go in reading direction (left to right) when you use this technique!

You can also add the magnetic lenses to your Diana Mini. Therefor add the self sticking metal ring to the lens and attach the chosen lens (Tunnelvison, Macro or Fisheye). See here my previous blog entry

cool shots! for the fake panorama shots, make sure it's a cloudy day or the shots will end up being overexposed! i've got some nice shots of billiards with some cool effects with my diana mini. :-) cheers everyone! let's keep experimenting!

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